A View from Developmental Systems Self Psychology: Discussion of Joseph Newirth's Paper, “A Case Study of Power and the Eroticized Transference–Countertransference”

Abstract

The clinical case that centers on a female patient who presented with a generalized sense of despair, hopelessness, and shame is discussed. Infant research, child development, neurobiology, trauma research, and nonlinear dynamic systems theory are employed in recontextualizing concepts of defense, resistance, dissociation, development, and therapeutic action. Specific positive new experiences, emergent from within the analytic dyad, lead to the development of consolidated, integrated self-states and a securely consolidated, intimate attachment to the other, which proved mutative.